Exploring American Jewish History through 50 Historic Treasures

Reviews / Votes

Decter's (Interpreting American Jewish History at Museums and Historic Sites) latest assembles 50 objects-some iconic, some ordinary-to represent the Jewish experience in the United States. The book is divided into six chronological parts, beginning with Jewish life in the United States before the 1820s and continuing through the present. Among the objects pictured in the book (all in full color) are postcards, a ketubah (a Jewish marriage contract), a letter from George Washington, photographs of synagogues' interiors and exteriors, a cookbook, a peddler's wagon, the Maxwell House Passover Haggadah, and the linotype used at the Jewish Daily Forward, a Yiddish-language socialist newspaper founded in 1897. Although these objects come from all parts of the country, there is some emphasis on the New York and Baltimore areas. Decter writes that it was difficult to select only 50 objects, but readers will find that they all appropriately reflect the lives of Jewish Americans as well as the history of the United States. An intriguing, illustrated volume that showcases the link between Jewish artifacts and U.S. history. * Library Journal * This carefully curated collection of materials from American Jewish history is a testament to the power of artifacts to augment historical narrative. Accompanied by insightful explanatory text, items are grouped chronologically and thematically. Historical focus is nicely balanced between items that illuminate life inside the insular American Jewish community and items that illustrate the integration and influence of that community on America's rich cultural and ethnic mix. Included here are the distressing, the humorous, and the unexpected. Explicit exclusion and ridicule of Jews is illustrated by a 1950s "Gentiles Only" sign posted at a Baltimore swimming club and a 1901 Puck magazine cover of a plump Jewish woman sitting among ridiculously extravagant wealth. Juxtaposed are the cover of a When You Live in Hawaii Passover Cookbook from 1989 along with a "There's One in Every Minyan" Pride T-shirt. This title will see heavy use in academic collections that support sociological research into the incorporation of the Jewish people, or of any ethnic minority, into the American blend. Undoubtedly it will also see heavy use in public-library collections serving communities with Jewish populations. * Booklist * Avi Decter's exploration of the American Jewish experience is imaginative and ingenious. His engaging book merits the highest praise for making the legacy of the past into something that is fresh and vivid. -- Stephen J. Whitfield, author of In Search of American Jewish Culture. Avi Decter has chosen his treasures of American Jewish history wisely. He has interpreted these 'treasures' clearly and concisely without compromising the complexity of his subject, the more than three and half centuries that Jews have spent on American shores. This book offers a general understanding of American Jewish history and an in depth look into some of its material and documentary treasures, each illustrative of its era. Well done indeed! -- Michael Berenbaum, Distinguished Professor of Jewish Studies, Director Sigi Ziering Institute, American Jewish University